Developing Geospatial Solutions using Open Source
This is one of the three books identified by the Education and Curriculum Committee that should be written. The other books are Using Open Source GIS and Developing Web Mapping Solutions Using Open Source.
Approach for writing this book
Using the application categories from http://freegis.org we'll gather problems or use cases, maybe divide them into subproblems, and describe how they can be solved using the free tools.
The tools are programming languages, libraries, command line tools, and customizable applications.
- Problem: Share GPS data between applications
- Subproblem: Parse GPX
- Explanation: GPX is an XML application for GPS data. Parsing gives us the GPS data.
- Problem:
- Subproblem: GeoTag Media
- Explanation:
- Problem:
- Subproblem: Track logs
- Explanation:
- Problem: Edit a GPS track
- | example data
- Requirements: Show the track on a map as editable lines, show the coordinates on a spreadsheet allowing edits, link the two representations
- Subproblem: Import the GPS track to the editor
- Subproblem: Export the track from the system
| Use case | Description | Perl | Ruby | Python |
| Parse GPX | What is GPX? | Perl based solution | Ruby based solution | PyGPX |
| GeoTag Media | RDFWeb geoloc_media.pl (original geoloc_media) | Ruby? | Python? | |
| Track logs | Geo::Track::Log | Ruby | Python |
Projection-Conversion
- Problem: Convert between WGS84 and local projections
- Problem: Convert from lat+long to easting and northing, as used on printed maps
| Use case | Description | Perl | Ruby | Python |
| Change between projections | MySociety Code | geo_helper.py | ||
| Convert from lat+long to easting+northing | geo_helper.py |